Van Gogh’s world-famous Sunflowers bound for National Gallery of Australia exhibition of National Gallery of London works

Vincent van Gogh put the spotlight on sunflowers in his famous paintings — and the beautiful blooms are again having their moment in the sun.

Saskia Havekes calls it “a storm of sunflowers”, and the 1500 exuberant blooms do seem to burst like fireworks in the intimate confines of the florist’s shop.

Ms Havekes cups their individual faces with a loving hand, seeing in each sunflower a little character all its own.

Tuesday is the first day of summer, and the buttery yellow sunflowers beam like joyous faces. No wonder Ms Havekes says they’ve been the flower of choice ever since the arrival of the pandemic.

Locked-down households everywhere deliberately sought out bunches of the cheerful flowers to ease the strain of isolation and the constant stream of worrying news.

Ms Havekes has never known sunflowers to be as popular as they are now, with growers struggling to meet the ongoing demand.

Vincent van Gogh, with whom Ms Havekes shares Dutch heritage, certainly revered sunflowers.

Their sunny abandon attracted him at some of the most painful times of his life.

Sunflowers first appeared in van Gogh’s paintings in 1886.

Florist Saskia Havekes will create sunflower arrangements to go with the National Gallery of Australia’s exhibition, Botticelli to Van Gogh: Masterpieces from the National Gallery. Picture: Tim Hunter

But it was two years later, when he was living in the rural, southern French town of Arles, that van Gogh created a series of seven sunflower paintings.

Except for the one in a private collection and the one that was destroyed in World War II, van Gogh’s sunflower paintings are among the most instantly recognisable and reproduced artworks in the world.

And one of them — some say the best one in the series — is coming to Australia.

The rarely travelled Sunflowers, 1888, normally hangs in the National Gallery in London’s Trafalgar Square.

The picture has been there since 1924, 34 years after the artist’s death, when the National Gallery acquired it from van Gogh’s sister-in-law Johanna van Gogh Bonger.

Sunflowers is the most popular painting in the National Gallery, which boasts one of the finest art collections in the world.

Sunflowers is coming to Australia next year in the exhibition titled Botticelli to Van Gogh: Masterpieces from the National Gallery, London.

The show will be on view from March 5 until June 14, and tickets go on sale on December 1.

Ms Havekes, who runs Grandiflora in Sydney’s Elizabeth Bay, is official florist to the exhibition.

She’s never seen one of van Gogh’s sunflower paintings outside the pages of art books, and is very excited that one of them will at last be on Australian soil.

No doubt she will be granted a special peek at Sunflowers while she and her team are creating the sunflower arrangements for the exhibition’s big launch day.

Vincent van Gogh’s Sunflowers 1888. Picture: National Gallery London

Florist Nakita Dorward with sunflowers at Saskia Havekes’ shop. Picture: Tim Hunter

Ms Havekes is already working with growers to make sure enough sunflowers are blooming in time.

Van Gogh painted sunflowers, as he wrote, “with the gusto of a Marseillais eating bouillabaisse”.

He associated the colour of sunflowers with the hot sun of Arles, where his creativity reached its dazzling peak.

Sunflowers were already in his blood.

In Dutch culture, sunflowers represent light and spirituality, writes UK journalist Martin Bailey in his book, The Sunflowers are Mine: The Story of Van Gogh’s Masterpiece.

Van Gogh painted his sunflowers series to decorate his Arles home, the Yellow House, in preparation for the arrival of fellow artist Paul Gauguin.

(Their volatile friendship famously culminated in Vincent cutting off a piece of his own ear.)

Martin Bailey believes the National Gallery’s Sunflowers was probably painted on August 26, 1888.

In that week, van Gogh had already done three other sunflower paintings, and was working feverishly.

“Painting comes to me as if in a dream,” van Gogh wrote at the time.

Of the seven paintings of sunflowers that he eventually completed, five are in public art galleries around the world.

One was destroyed in Japan in 1945, and one is in a private collection and is therefore removed from the public gaze.

Director Gabriele Finaldi is sending Sunflowers to Australia as part of the National Gallery’s first push to share its collection with the rest of the world.

Visitors to the National Gallery, London, admire Sunflowers by Vincent van Gogh.

“We’re very keen to tell the story of the National Gallery beyond our own borders,” Ms Finaldi says.

“We’re effectively presenting a mini National Gallery, because the selection has been conceived to reflect the range and quality of the National Gallery’s collection.

“So we start in the Renaissance with Paulo Uccello and we finish in the 19th Century with van Gogh and Monet.”

Botticelli to Van Gogh: Masterpieces from the National Gallery, London will be on view at the National Gallery of Australia, Canberra, from March 5 until June 14, 2021.

Tickets go on sale on Tuesday at nga.gov.au

The writer travelled to London courtesy of Art Exhibitions Australia.

Originally published as Van Gogh’s world-famous Sunflowers bound for National Gallery of Australia exhibition of National Gallery of London works